


How To Stay/How To Say Goodbye

by Angelofalbion (Claytonator)



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Dialogue Heavy, Episode Ignis Spoilers, Gen, Missing Scene, Very little context sorry I guess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-05
Updated: 2020-09-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:06:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,418
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26305333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Claytonator/pseuds/Angelofalbion
Summary: Ignis is confusingly steadfast after everything that happened in Altissia and Noctis doesn't understand. Until he does.
Relationships: Noctis Lucis Caelum & Ignis Scientia
Kudos: 20





	How To Stay/How To Say Goodbye

They were finally back on the train, continuing their journey to Gralea. Obtaining the weapon from the tomb in Cartanica had drained all of them, physically and emotionally. Things seemed a little better after Ignis had made it clear no one was responsible for his safety, even blind as he was now. Still, too many things had gone unsaid since Altissia. 

They rode in silence mostly, especially once Gladio and Prompto declared they were going to find food.

"Why? Why aren’t you mad at me?” Noctis asked, seemingly out of nowhere. 

Ignis sat across from him, head bowed low. 

“I couldn’t possibly be angry at you, Noct.” 

“Gladio’s right. I’ve been self-absorbed and moping and I haven’t been there for you at all. I’m not the only one who’s hurting.”

Ignis shrugged defeatedly. Gods, how would he explain this one? 

“You’re not, that much is true. But I cannot blame my blindness on you. I knew there would be a cost to using the Ring when it wasn’t meant for me. You were worth the cost.” 

“I’m sick of people getting hurt because of me. So what if I am the Chosen King, it’s not right.” 

“You will end that suffering. It is your destiny. As it is mine to serve you, however I can.” _Even when it won’t be enough to save you,_ he thought. 

Noct was silent. Ignis sat quietly, listening to the rumble of the train, the murmured conversations of other passengers in the car. 

“I won’t be upset...if you leave. It’s not fair of me to expect you to stay when it only puts your life in danger.”

Ignis smiled, trying to hide the sadness that threatened to swallow him whole when he thought of what was to come. 

“I choose to stay, Your Majesty. It is the least I can do. And if my time comes to bow out, well, then I will choose that as well. Until then, I will remain where I always am, at your side.” 

“I...thank you, Ignis.” 

He almost sounded like he was a real king as well, not just some lost kid trying to cling on to any scrap of hope he could find. 

It was quiet for so long after that that Ignis assumed Noctis must have dozed off, rocked to sleep by the gentle swaying of the train. Until he heard him say, barely above a whisper -

“I still don’t get it. I don’t think I’ll ever understand why you want to stay, after everything.” 

Well. That was the crux of the matter wasn’t it. Ignis’s thoughts returned to Bahamut’s warning, day after day, never letting him forget that his time with Noctis was limited. That, at the end of it all, he would lose the greatest man he’d ever known. It was impossible to be angry. He was too overcome with grief. 

“Are Gladio and Prompto back yet?”

“Huh? No, still in the dining car, why?”

“This isn’t for them to hear. In Altissia, when I used the Ring - there was a vision.”

“What? How come you never said anything? What did you see?”

“I saw you. And Bahamut. And -” He couldn’t do this. Telling Noct that he was to die would break him in two, here and now. Surely, it wasn’t his place to tell Noct what the gods would later tell him anyway? “I can’t say the rest. I don’t believe it is my place to tell you.”

“You’re the only one to have seen it. Maybe it can help us win this war?”

“No. It won’t make any difference to the war whether I tell you or not. I am sure Bahamut will tell you when the time is right.” 

“Iggy, I -”

“No, you shan’t persuade me. Grant me this small grace, Noct. Suffice to say, I will be with you till the end, I won’t have it any other way.”

He heard Noctis sigh heavily, then stand up. 

“I’m going to the dining car. Do you want anything?”

“No, thank you. I will await you here.” 

And with that, the conversation was over. Hopefully, when the time came, Noct would understand why he couldn’t say more than he did. 

***

The last thing Noctis saw was his friends’ faces bursting into the chamber, sprinting down the bridge, even Ignis was running, using the handrail as a guide. And then everything was blue and he was falling. 

It seemed like a lifetime that he fell. Or was he floating? He could feel the Crystal's power surrounding him, seeping into his skin, his muscles, his very bones. His mind started to drift away, seeking rest at long last, rest in the warm embrace of the Crystal. 

Bahamut appeared before him, armor and swords gleaming in the infinite blue. Noctis hadn’t even considered what to say when the rumbling voice trembled through him. Noctis stared in awe and horror as he heard the words that were surely the ones Ignis had refused to tell him. 

_Providence._

No.

It couldn’t be. 

_The King of Kings shall be granted the power to banish the darkness, but the blood price must be paid._

No.

_To cast out the usurper and usher in dawn's light will cost the life of the Chosen._

It couldn’t-

_Many sacrificed all for the King, so must the King sacrifice himself for all._

Bahamut rumbled on, making clear fate’s plans for the young king in brutal honesty. All the legends, all the prophecies, it all lead to - this? At the end of everything, he was to die? 

He’d lost so much. How could he lose more. How could he leave those who had devoted everything to him, to getting him this far? 

Were all his dreams of the future truly to come to naught? Lucis would be no more, he would be the last - the last king of Lucis.

It wasn't fair. How could this be the end? How could it be that after everything he’d lost, everything he’d gone through, his reward was to save the world and die in the saving? 

Bahamut left him there, lost in the endless expanse of the Crystal’s light, alone with his terrible fate. He’d been doomed from the start and he hadn’t even known it. Had he doomed his friends with him? Would they face the dawn unscathed? Would they rebuild what he'd been lost? 

Without him? 

The only friends he’d ever known, and he had to leave them. 

He fell for an eternity. 

***

And then he awoke, flat on his back on the stone, in what could only have been a prison cell, long ago. His hair was longer, and at some point he’d grown a beard, but he had nothing to tell him how long he’d been lost inside the Crystal. And it had spat him out here.  
Spat him out when he’d finally accepted what had to be done. He rose to his feet, felt for the ring on his finger, and started walking. 

To home, and to die. 

If Talcott hadn’t picked him up on the road to Hammerhead, he was sure he’d have walked straight past and avoided having to say goodbye to anyone at all. Clearly the gods had other ideas about where he was to go and when. 

He couldn't bring himself to tell them, not fully. He only told them that after defeating Ardyn and reclaiming the throne, he had to invoke the power of Providence alone. That he would be able to end the accursed darkness. He watched Ignis carefully as he spoke, noticed how he froze when he said he would be alone on the throne. He dismissed Gladio and Prompto’s questions easily enough, them sensing he wasn’t ever going to tell them the whole of what had happened to him anyway and that it was better to give up on a lost cause. 

Ignis stayed silent. 

Noctis waited until the others were distracted, cleaning up after dinner, and he took Ignis by the shoulder and led him away to sit in the dark and quiet together. He took a deep breath. Out with it, Noct. 

“I think I finally get it, why you stayed after Altissia. You knew didn’t you? That Providence means sacrificing myself?”

“I did. And I meant every word I said. I’m with you until the very end.” 

“Thank you, old friend.” 

Maybe, with the strength of his friends to guide him, he would have the strength he needed after all. 

He would have the strength to say goodbye

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in an hour and a half flat after finishing Episode Ignis and realising that Ignis knew Noct was going to die, a realisation which promptly tore out my heart all over again. So obviously that means I had to share. Unbeta-ed. 
> 
> (It's been so long since I posted anything, I hope I got the formatting right)


End file.
